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CONGRESSIONAL ADDRESS. 






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" You have not, as good Patriots should do, studied 
The public good, hut your particular ends ; 
Factious among yourselves, pre/erring such 
To offices and honors, as ne'e?- read y 

The elements of saving policy ; 
But deeply skill' d in all the principles 
That usher to destruction!" 

—Timoleon to the Citizens of Syracuse. • 



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WASHINGTON, D. C. 

^'"^ July, 1864. 



AN ADDRESS 

To the People of the United States, and Particu- 
larly to the People of the States which 
adhere to the Federal Government. 



As members of the Thirty-Eighth Congress, politically opposed 
to the present Federal Admi'iistration and represenling the Oppo- 
sition Union sentiment of the country, we address ourselves to the 
people of the United States: and our object will be to show (as far 
as may be done within the limits of an .address) that there is jiood 
reason for changing the Administration and Policy of this G-eneral 
Grovernment through the InstrumRntality of suffrage in the elections of 
the present year. 

It is our settled conviction that men now in public station, who con- 
trol the policy of the Government, cannot or will not perform those 
duties which are necessary to save the country and perpetuate its lib- 
erties. Many of them are engrossed by political and perjoual objects 
which do not comport with the public welfare, and will not subserve 
it ; others have false or perverted views of our system of free govern- 
ment, or are inspired by passions which continually mislead them; 
and the Ooposition in Congress are powerless to check the 
majority, and are unable even to secure such investigation of the Ex- 
ecutive Departments and of the conduct of Government officials, as 
will prevent abuse and secure honesty, economy, and efficiency in 
the public service. 

Profoundly, painfully impressed by passing events, we turn from 
the President of the United States and from the majority in Congress, 
upon whom all remonstrance against misgoveriiment would be wasted, 
to address ourselves to our fellow-countrymen at large; and we appeal 
to them to interpose in public affairs, and by a proper exertion of their 
sovereign electoral power, to decree that these United States shall be 
justly governed, re-united, tranquillized and saved 1 

ENGROSSMENT GF POWER. 

What we propose to notice in the first place, as introductory to our 
examination of public affairs, is, the consolidation of oil power in the 
Government of the United States into the hands of a single political 



interest. The party of the Administration has not heen suhjected 
to any efficient check upon its action from an opposing interest or 
party, since its attainment of power in 1861. Carrying all the 
Northern, Western, and Pacific States, with a single exception, at the 
Presidential election of 1860, and being relieved from all southern op- 
positi(;n in Congress by the withdrawal of the States of that section, 
it was able to do its will and pleasure without check or hindrance in 
the Government of the United States. All public patronage was sub- 
sidized to its uses; all Government outlays (and they were ennrmoua 
in amount) were disbursed by its officials; all public power was 
wielded by its arm ; and this condition of things has continued to the 
present time. It has revelled in power, and of inevitable necessity, 
from its very nature and from the opportunities presented it, it has 
abused its powers ; it has forgotten or despised and trampled under 
foot the duties imposed upon it by the people, and the objects an- 
nounced by it in the outset have been supplanted by others, which 
now inspire its action and occupy its hopes. 

No truth is more certain, none better established by history, than 
this, that political power is aggressive ; that it will always seek to en- 
large itself and to increase its domination, and that no free govern- 
ment is possible where by the very constitution of the Government 
itself, power is not made a check to power. Freedom is secured by 
the action and reaction upon each other of political forces, so organ- 
ized ard so limited that no one can absolutely dominate over or con- 
trol the rest. And hence, the necessity of constitutions which shall 
so divide and arrange the powers of government, that no single interest, 
class, or individual, shall become supreme and engross the whole 
mass of political power. Now the capital mischief (or rather source 
of mischief and evil) in the Government of the United States during 
the pa.'t three years and at this moment, is, that a single political in- 
terest or party, of evil constitution^ has obtained and exercised the 
whole mass of Government powers, free from all check or limitation 
-whatsoever. The fatal results are obvious. It has been false to its 
promises made as the condition upon which it attained power ; it has 
broken the Constitution shamefully and often ; it has wasted the public 
treasure ; it has su>pendcd the ancient writ of liberty, the " habeas 
corjMis," rendering it impossible for the citizen to obtain redress 
against the grossest outrage ; it has changed the war into a humanita- 
rian crusade outside of any constitutional or lawful object; it has 
grossly mismanaged the war in the conduct of military operations; it 
has degraded the currency of the country by profuse Issues of paper 
money, and confiscated private property by a legal tender enactment; 
and, to ictain its power, that it may riot in plunder and be subjected 
to no check and to no restraint from public opinion, it has undertaken 
to control State elections by direct nuiitary force or by fraudulent 
selection of voters from the army. The'-e ai'e some of the results 
already achieved, and "the end is not yet." No impartial observer 
can contemplate the future without apprehension of still greater evils, 
or can doubt that some real division of public power or its lodgment 



in new hands, Is necessary not merely to the success but to the very 
existence of free government in the United States. 

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY. 

The evil of uncontrolled party domination in government will be 
greater or less according to the character and objects of the party in 
power. The Democratic party, which ordinarily has administered the 
Government of the United States, even in the utmost plentitude of 
its power, did not fall into gross abuse or threaten the liberties of the 
country. Although it required to be checked upon occasion, and that 
its policy and conduct should be subjected to rigid scrutiny by an active 
opposition, there was great security against its abuse of its powers in 
the principleri and doctrines to which it held ; for its creed was estab- 
lished for it by men of the most sterling virtue and profound wisdom, 
who justly comprehended the nature ot free governments and the dan- 
gers to which they are exposed. Strict construction of the Constitution, 
a sparing use of the powers of Government, moderate expenditures 
and equal laws, became the articles of a political creed which preserved 
the Government from abuse and degeneracy, kept the States in har- 
mony, and secured the growth and development of a material prosper- 
ity unexampled in the history of nations. Its great merit was that it 
was a constitutional party, (in the true sense of that term,) subjecting 
itself cheerfully, thoroughly and constantly, to all the rules and limita- 
tions of the fundamental law. Its principles themselves, checked it 
and kept it within bounds. As its contests for power were upon the 
Tery ground that there should be no over-action of government but 
only a due exertion of its authorized powers, there was the less neces- 
sity to confront it with a powerful opposition. Yet such opposition 
always existed, and was no doubt necessary to the safe and successful 
action of the Government under its management. 

THE PARTY OF THE ADMINISTRATION. 

But with the party now in power the case is widely different. Its 
main strength lies in States which voted against Mr. Jefferson in 1800, 
against Mr. 3Iadison in 1812, against Andrew Jackson in 1828, and 
against Mr. Polk in 1844; and it embraces that school of opinion in 
this country which has always held to extreme action by the General 
Government, favoritism to particular interests, usurpation of State 
powers, large public expenditures, and, generally, to constructions of 
the Constitution which favor Federal authority and extend its preten- 
sions. Besides, it is essentially sectional and aggressive — the very em- 
bodiment of that disunion partyism foreseen and denounced by Wash- 
ington and Jackson in those Farewell Addresses which they left on 
record for the instruction of their countrymen, and by Henry Clay in a 
memorable address to the Legislature of Kentucky. That it could not 
safely be intrusted .with the powers of the Federal Government is a 
conclusion which inevitably results from this statement of its compo- 
sition and character. But the question is no longer one of mere opinion 



or conjecture. Having been tried by the actual possession of Govern- 
ment powers and been permitted to exhibit fully its true nature, it has 
completely justified the theory which condemns it; as will plainly ap- 
pear from considering particular measures of policy pursued by it. 
From among these we shall select several for particular esamination, 
in order that our general statement of Republican unfitness for the 
possession of Government powers may be illustrated, established, and 
made good against any possible contradiction. 

MILITARY INTERFERENCE WITH ELECTIONS. 

This has taken place in two ways : 

First. By the selection of soldiers of the army to be sent home tem- 
porarily to participate in State elections. 

This practice, in connection with sending home on such occasions 
large numbers of Government ofiicers and employees in the civil ser- 
vice, has changed the result of many Sta'e elections and giveu to the 
party in power an unjust advantage. With the large poweis possessed 
by the Administration for the purposes of the war; with the large ia- 
creas-e of appointments to civil office and the employment of vast num- 
bers of persons in all parts of the country in the business of Go\ern- 
ment, the Administration and its party have been enabled to in- 
fluence elections to an alarming extent. The powers conferred by the 
whole people upon the Government, and the revenues derived by taxa- 
tion from the whole people or derived from loans which become 
charged upon the whole mass of individual property, have been 
used in an infinite number of ways for party purposes and to tecure 
to the Republican interest, in the Federal and State Governments, 
the continued possession of power. The injustice and corruptive tendency 
of this sjstom cannot be denied, and alone should be held ^ufficicnt to 
condemn the party of the Administration. It is notorious that time 
after time, on the eve of doubtful elections, thousands of voters have 
been sent home from the army to turn the scale between panics and to 
secure an Administration triumph. And this has been done, not upon 
the principle of sending home citizen soldiers indiscriminately and 
without reference to their political opinions and attachments, (which 
would have been just,) but upon the principle of selecting republican 
soldiers, or of granting furloughs upon the condition of a promise from 
the persons favored that they would support Administration candi- 
dates. We mention elections in New Hampshire, Conneciicut, and 
Pennsylvania, as instances of such most base and unjust proceeding, by 
which unscrupulous power has defeated the true expression of popular 
opinion, and obtained political advantages which were shameful to it 
and deeply injurious to the country. Will a free people consent to have 
their system of elections thus perverted and corrupted, and expect to 
erjny, in spite thereof, the peaceable fruits of good government and 
honest rule ? 

Second. A still more grave offense against the purity and independ- 



ence of elections has been committed by the Administration in the 
States of Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland and Delaware. The partic- 
ular circumstances of Government interference were somewhat different 
in each of these States, but the substantial facts in all, were these : 

1. That the military power of the General Government was directly 
applied to control the elections, and that officers and soldiers of the 
army of the United States were openly used for the purpose. 

2. That the States in question were at the time in a state of profound 
peace and quiet, and that with the exception of a single congressional 
district in Kentucky, no Rebel raid or invasion into them was then in 
progress or expected. 

3. That in each of them there existed an adhering State govern- 
ment, exercising complete and unquestioned jurisdiction under Gov- 
ernors and other State officials whose devotion and fidelity to the 
Government of the United States were unquestionable. 

4. That there was no official call upon the Federal Government by 
the Executive or Legislature of any one of those States for protection 
against domestic violence, (under the particular provision of the Con- 
stitution of the United States, authorizing such call,) but that the in- 
terference, in most cases, was against the desire, and notably in the 
case of Maryland against the protest of the State authorities. 

5. That thousands of qualified persons were prevented from voting 
at those elections, and in most of those States the result of the 
election was changed from what it would have been without mili- 
tary interference. The aged and timid were deterred from attending 
the elections; many who attended were kept from approaching the 
polls; and, in many cases, actual outrage prevented the legal voter from 
exercising his right. The full proof of all this appears in a number 
of contested-election cases in Congress, in official papers from the Gov- 
ernors of several of the States in question, in reports of committees of 
the State Legislatures, and from other reliable sources ; and we recom- 
mend the whole subject, as one of fearful importance, to the examina- 
tion and judgment of our countrymen. 

^CREATION OF BOGUS STATES. 

The steps taken towards establishing a system of false and unjust 
representation in the Government of the United States, should also be 
carefully considered. 

In the first place, let us consider what has taken place in regard to 
the State of Virginia. In 1860, Virginia had a population, (^including 
slaves,) of 1,596,318 ; Pennsylvania a population of 2,906,215 ; New 
York a population of 3,880,735. While the two States last named ad- 
hered faithfully to the Government of the United States, and have 
since borne on its behalf, their pioper share of the burdens of the war, 
Virginia revolted, and two thirds of her population was thrown into 
the scale of the enemy. Whatrtsult followed as to the representation 
of that State in the Congress of the Union ? The comparatively small 
part of the State which adhered to the Union was recognized as coi.- 



8 

stituting, for political purposes, the State of Virginia ; an improvised 
Legislature of this adhering fragment of the State, el»3cted two Sena- 
tors, who were admitted into the Senate of the United States, and 
Kepresentatives from the same territory were admitted into the Federal 
House of Representatives. The liberal principles of construction upon 
which this was done, may stand justified by the peculiar circumstances 
of the case. But there was a further proceeding for which no warrant 
of power or pretence of necessity can be shown. A part of the ad- 
hering Virginia territory was permitted to form itself into a new State, 
was admitted into the Union under the name of West Virginia, 
(ah hough the Constitution of the United States declares that no State 
shall be divided for the formation of a new one without the express 
assent of the Legislature thereof,) and Senators therefrom were admit- 
ted into the United States Senate. A very small part of the old State, 
not included within the boundaries of the new one, remained within 
our military lines, to be, as well as the new State, represented by two 
menibers in the Senate. Thus, under Republican manipulation, one 
third of the ancient State of Virginia has four votes in the Senate of 
the United States, and may neutralize the votes of both New York and 
Pennsylvania in that body. The "Ancient Dominion," with a pop- 
ulation a little exceeding one half that of Pennsylvania, is represented 
by fdur Senators in the Congress of the United States, and by two in 
the Confederate Congress at Richmond ! Pennsylvania, with her three 
millions of people, remains true to the Union, and retains her former 
vote in the Senate; Virginia turns traitor, sends two thirds of her 
population under the Confederate flag, and forthwith has her represen- 
tation doubled in the Senate of the United States, and that, too, in 
defiance of a constitutional provision forbidding it, and avoided only 
upon £ strained construction or implication totally at variance with the 
plain fact. Against the plain truth of the case, and without necessity, 
it was assumed that the Legislature of a fiagment of the State repre- 
sented the whole for the purpose of assenting to its division and the 
erection therefrom of a new member of the Federal Union. 

We pass from this case to speak of matter more recent. A State 
goveinment has been set up in Louisiana, under the supervision of a 
major general of the United States Army, which, although it holds the 
al'egiance of but part of the population, we suppose is to have the 
former representation of that State in Congress; and in Tennessee and 
Arkansas there have been proceedings of a similar description. The 
indications are clear and full, that in these cases and in others of sim- 
ilar character which may follow them, the President of the United 
States, through his ofiicers of the array in command in the States to 
be represented, dictates and Trill dictate and control the whole proceed- 
ing for renewed representation, and upon principles most unequal, un- 
just and odious. 

A recent attempt to set up one of these bogus States in Florida, un- 
der a presidential agent, must be fresh in the recollection of the 
country, as must also be tte military disaster by which that attempt 
■was rendered abortive. 



. But why refer to particular cases? Why reason upon events that 
have happened, or upon probabilities which present themselves before 
us? The President of thcj United States has, himself, in his me-sage 
at the opening of the present session of Congress, and in his proclama- 
tion appended thereto, announced his programme for the reconstruction 
and consequent representation of the States which may be rescued in 
whole or in part from the Confederates during the existing war. 

The Proclamation extends a pardon to all persons in the rebellious 
States, (except certain Confederate officers, &c.,) upon condition that 
they shall take, subscribe, and keep a prescribed oath, one provisiou cf 
which is, that they will abide by and faithfully support all proclama- 
tions of the President made during the existing rebellion having refer- 
ence to slaves, so long and so far as not modified or declared void by 
decision of the Supreme Court. And it further proclaims, that when- 
ever in any one of the Confederate States, *• a number of persons not 
less than one tenth in number of the votes cast in such State at the 
Presidential election of 18G0, having taken and kept the aforesaid oath, 
&c., shall re-establish a State Grovernment which shall be republican, 
and in nowise contravening said oath, such State shall be recognized 
as the true government of the State." 

This presidential paper must be regarded as the most remarkable one 
ever issued by an American Executive. The one tenth part of a pop- 
ulation are to exercise the powers of the whole, and, if Congress con- 
cur, are to be represented in the Government of the United S-ates and 
in our electoral colleges for the choice of President, as if they were the 
whole ! And this one tenth is to be made up of men who will solemnly 
swear that they will obey and keep all the President's proclamations 
upon a particular subject, issued during the present war; not procla- 
mations which he may have issued already, but future ones also. A more 
abject oath was never framed in the history of the whole earth. Was a 
religious obligation ever before required of citizen or subject, in any age 
or country, to obey and keep the future and unknown edicts of the Execu- 
tive will ? And if usurped authority can accomplish its object, a handful 
of men in a State, degraded by such an oath, are to wield representative 
votes in the Government of the United States, and enter electoral colleges 
to extend the power of the master to whom their fealty is sworn. 

The lawless and dangerous character of the Administration must 
most evidently appear from the foregoing review of its policy and con- 
duct regarding popular elections and the organization of States. 

But its incapacity (if not profligacy) will as clearly appear from an 
examination of its measures in the prosecution of the war, and to some 
of those measures we will now direct attention. 

RAISING OF TROOPS, 

In April, 1861, at the outbreak of hostilities, the army of the Uni- 
ted States was small and wholly inadequate to meet the exigency of 
war which had arisen. The President ealled for seventy-five thousand 
troops from the States to serve for a period of three months, and sub- 



10 

sequently made other calls. Finally, in the latter part of 1862, drafts 
were ordered in several States to fill up their quotas, and the proceed- 
ing for that purpose was under the State authorities, pursuant to State 
laws and some general regulations of the War Department framed for 
the occasion. Thus the case stood as to the raising of troops at the 
commencement of 1863, and the troops in service at that date consisted 
of the liegular Army of the United States as it stood at the outbreak 
of hostilities, with subsequent enlistments added, and of volunteers 
and drafted militia of the States, organized and officered as companies 
and regiments by State authority. Volunteering had at one time been 
checked by the Administration, upon a statement by it that all the 
troops needed were already in service. Soon, however, the demand 
for men was renewed, and at the beginning of 1863 the number 
called for and raised had become enormous. But for the after 
purposes of the Administration it was perfectly feasible for it to call 
for additional troops in the manner theretofore practiced, which in- 
volved State assistance and cooperation and s-ecured to the troops 
raised their regular organization as State militia under the laws of 
their respective States. The army bore, mainly, the character of a 
public force contributed by the States under the fifteenth and sixteenth 
clauses of the eighth section of the first article of the Constitution, 
which authorize Congress " To provide for calling forth the militia to 
execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections, and repel inva- 
sions," and " to provide for organizing, arming and disciplining the 
militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in 
the service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively 
the appointment of the officers," &c. 

The power of the Federal Government to call for troops, and the 
power of the States to supply them, organizing them into companies 
and regiments and appointing their officers, were unquestionable, as 
was also the power of the States to select those troops which they were 
to contribute, by draft or lot. 

CONSCRIPTION. 

But early in 1863 a new system for the raising of troops was estab- 
lished by act of Congress. This was a system of conscription, (the 
word and the idea being borrowed from the French,) and was without 
example in the history of the United States. Passing by the State 
authorities and by the clauses of the Constitution above mentioned, it 
put the General Government in direct communication with the whole 
arms-bearing population of the country, and assumed for the General 
Government exclusive and absolute control over the whole proceeding 
of raising troops. The validity of this enactment has been questioned, 
and it is one of the debatable points which belong to the history of 
the war. For it has been argued with much of force and reason that 
the power of Congress to raise armies although a general power is not 
unlimited, and that laws of conscription by it are not " necessary and 
proper " when the forces required can be raised with perfect certainty 



11 

and convenience from the militia of the States under the provisions of 
the Constitution above cited. But, passing this point, the inquiry 
arises, why was the former system involving State co-operation aban- 
doned, and a new and questionable one substituted ? No clear and 
adequate reason for the measure appears in the debates of the Congress 
which passed it, unless the suggestion made by one of its leading sup- 
porters in the House of Representatives that it was in hostility to "the 
accursed doctrine of State rights" be accepted as such reason. We 
must, therefore, conclude that it was the policy of the authors of the 
law to deprive the States of the appointment of the officers of the 
• troops raised, and to absorb that power into the hands of the Federal 
Administration ; that the act was the measure of a party to increase its 
influence and power, and to prevent the possibility of any participaiioa 
therein by the Governments of the States. 

We believe it to be certain that this measure has entailed great ex- 
pense upon the Treasury of the United States; that it has created 
unnecessarily a large number of Federal officers, distributed through- 
out the country; and that, while it has been no more efficient than 
the system which required State co-operation, it has been much less 
satisfactory. 

If a necessity for raising troops by conscription be asserted, then it 
would follow that the revolutionary policy of the Administi-ation has 
alarmed and disgusted the people, and chilled that enthusiasm which 
in the earlier days of the contest filled our patriot army with brave and 
willing volunteers. 

BOUNTIES. 

What is further to be mentioned in this connection is the payment 
of bounties by the United States, by the State governments, and by 
cities, counties, and other municipalities. In their payment there has 
been great want of uniformity and system. The policy of the General 
Government has not been the same at all times, and in the States there 
has been infinite diversity. Upon the whole, the system of bounties has 
been costly and unequal ; the amount of indebtedness created by it is 
enormous, and unequal sums have been paid to soldiers of the same 
grade of merit. Under any system of local bounties to avoid con- 
scription, the wealthy parts of the country enjoy an advantage over 
others, and especially where manufacturing and other interests find it 
to their profit in providing the supplies of the war to retain their 
laborers at home, substituting payments of money in their stead, 
unless each State shall be firmly required to furnish the sub- 
stitutes to fill up its quota from its own citizens. But the 
General Government has permitted the agents of such interests in 
a State to go into other States and into the southern country and ob- 
tain enlistments for bounties, both of white and black troops, to be 
credited upon the quota of the State of the agent. If it shall hap pea 
hereafter that local payments of bounties, whether by States or by 
municip alities within them, be assumed by the Government of the 



12 

United States, the inequalities of the system and its extravagance in 
many cases will become a matter of concern to the whole people. And 
it is just matter of complaint against those who have held authority in 
the Federal Government, that by their policy and want of policy on 
this subject tlie burden of the war has been vastly increased, and been 
distributed irregularly and unfairly. 

The pecuniary outlay and indebtedness caused by payment of local 
bounties, being mostly incurred by powerful and influential communi- 
ties, it is quite possible that they may be recognized hereafter by Con- 
gress as a legitimate object of national assumption; and if this happen, 
those communities that have retained their laborers at liome, and 
thereby secured their prosperity during the war, will cast a part of the 
burden of their exemption upon other sections. 

Obviously what has been wanting has been wisdom and foresight 
in those who have controlled the public measures of the war, and who 
have resorted to one expedient after another without a fixed policy j 
who have acted where they ought not, and have failed to act where 
action and regulation were demanded. 

NEGRO TROOPS. 

But a subject which requires particular notice is, the employment 
of negro troops in the war. An act of Congress, passed the 17th day 
of July, 1862, authorized the President " to receive into the service of 
the United States for the purpose of constructing intrenchments, or 
performing camp service, or any other labor, or any military or naval 
service for which they might be fo' nd competent, persons of African 
descent; and such persons should be enrolled and organized under 
such regulations, rot inconsistent with the Constitution and laws, as 
the President might prescribe ;" and further, that they " should receive 
ten dollars per month and one ration, three dollars of which monthly 
pay might be in clothing." 

Without any other law on the subject prior in date to the present 
session of Congress, (except an imperfect provision in an act of 1862,) 
the President in his message of December 8, 1863, announced, that 
" of those who were slaves at the beginning of the rebellion, fully one 
hundred thousand are now in the United States military service, about 
one half of which number actually bear arms in the ranks." 

At the present session, on the 24th of February, an act amendatory 
of the conscription law of 1863 was approved, the twenty-fouith sec- 
tion of which provides for the enrollment of colored persons between 
twenty and forty-five years of age; that slaves of loyal masters en- 
rolled, drawn and mustered into the public service, shall be free, and 
one hundred dollars for each shall be paid to the master; and that in 
the slave States represented in Congress, the loyal master of a slave 
who volunteers into the public service &hall be paid a sum not exceed- 
ing three hundred dollars, out of the military commutation fund. 

By the army appropriation bill, approved June 15, 1864, it was 
further provided, "■ that all persons of color who have been or may be 



13 

mustered into the military service of the United States shall receive 
the same uniform, clothing, arms, equipments, camp equipage, rations, 
medical and hospital attendance, pay and emoluments, other than 
bounty, as other soldiers of the regular or volunteer forces of the 
United States of like arm of the service, from and after the first day 
of January, 1864; and that every person of color who shall hereafter 
be mustere 1 into the service, shall receive such sums in bouuty as the 
President shall order in the different States and parts of the United 
States, not exceeding one hundred dollars [each]." 

This enactment is similar in terms to a bill which passed the Senate 
in March last, upon the consideration of which it was announced, that 
at least two hundred thousand colored troops would be raised. Adding 
to this number the number state 1 by the President to be in service in 
December last, would make one quarter of a million of troops of this 
description. 

The measures above mentioned would establish the following points 
in the policy of the (lovernment. First. The employment of black 
troops generally, both slave and free. Second. The equality of black 
troops with white as to compensation and supplies ; and Third, The 
payment to the loyal master of a slave of a bounty of one hundred 
dollars when the slave is drafted into the service, or of a bounty not 
exceeding three hundred dollars, when he volunteers. 

The practical results of this policy are, to obtain an inferior quality of 
troops at the highest rate of expense ; to impose upon the Treasury 
the support of an enormous number of undisciplined and ignorant ne- 
groes; to recognize the principle of buying negroes from their mas- 
ters, whether the public interests require it or not, and to incur the 
risk of breaking down in the war because of the inefficiency of the 
forces employed in its prosecution. Besides, it is notorious that iu 
pursuing this policy, the negro women and children must, to a great 
extent, be thrown upon the Government for support or be left to 
perish. 

There has never been extensive objection to the employment of ne- 
groes under the act of 1862, in those war employments for which they 
are fitted as laborers and teamsters, and for camp service. In the 
warm parts of the country, especially, they could be thus usefully 
employed, and a reasonable number doubtless might also be 
employed for some sorts of service in the navy. But to 
employ an unwieldy number of them at such prodigious expense, 
is most evident folly and wror)g, and it will be well if signal dis- 
aster does not result from it. We know no reason for this extrava- 
gant, costly, and dangerous policy, except a desire of the majority in 
C'lngress to establish (if indeed their enactments could accomplish 
such object) the equality of the black and white races with each other. 
But doubtless, the employment of blacks in the war is to be made the 
pretext for extending to them the right of suffrage and also social po- 
sition, and to be followed, probably, by the organization of a consider- 
able body of them into a standing army. 



14 



INCREASE OF SOLDIERS' PAY. 

The immediate result of this policy of negroisra in the war has been 
to postpone, and at last to limit the increase of compensation to our 
citizen soldiers. Bills providing such increase were permitted to lie 
unacted upon in Congress for more than five months of the present 
session, and the bill finally adopted for that purpose was inadequate 
and made to take etfect only from the first day of May, 1864. It in- 
creased the pay of privates from thirteen to sixteen dollars per month, 
(without distinction of color,) and the pay of officers in somewhat sim- 
ilar proportion. But the smallness of this increase, as well as the 
delay in enacting it, was occasioned by the extravagant measures above 
mentioned. The Treasury, strained by the payment of enormous sums 
to negroes by reason of their employment in increased numbers and at 
increased rates of expense, could illy respond to the just demands 
made upon it in behalf of our citizen soldiers. 

Besides it is instructive to observe that in this legislation by Con- 
gress, while increased pay to white troops begins on the first of May, 
an increase to colored troops dates from the first of January. And a 
provision contained in the act of 15th of June authorizes the Attorney 
General of the United States to inquire whether increased pay under 
former laws cannot be allowed to negroes employed in the public service 
before the beginning of the present year, who were free on the 19th of 
April, 1861, and if he determine in favor of such allowance his decision 
shall be carried into effect by orders of the War Department. The 
majority in Congress, in pursuing the phantom of negro equality, are 
us improvident as they are impassioned. The decision of the War 
Department (in accordance with the opinion of its solicitor) as to the 
compensation of negroes under former laws, is to be opened and sub- 
jected to review by the Attorney General, in the hope that some addi- 
tional meaning may be wrung out of the old statutes justifying addi- 
tional expenditure upon a favorite object. 

It ought to be manifest to every reasonable man that negroes in 
service should be paid less than white troops, and that the increase of 
their pay from ten to sixteen dollars per month was unnecessary and 
profligate. The market value of their labor is known to be less than 
that of citizens, and it is equally clear that their services are much 
less valuable in the army. 

We have but to add under this head that additional pa}' to our citi- 
zen soldiers in service is but just and reasonable, and ought long since 
to have been provided. The great depreciation in the value of the 
currency in which they are paid, and the increased rates of price in 
the country affecting all their purchases and outlays, have demanded 
the notice and consideration of the Government. It is upon their ex- 
ertions that reliance must be placed for success in the war, and even 
for the preservation of the Treasury from embarrassment and the coun- 
try from pecuniary convulsion ; and whatever differences of opinion 
may exist as to measures of Goveuument policy, their merits and sacri- 



15 

fices demand recognition and gratitude from the whole mass of their 
countrymen. 

This gigantic scheme for the employment of negro troops at full 
rates of expense is, therefore, unwise as regards the prosecution of the 
war, and operates unjustly as to our citizen soldiery in service. In 
other words, it is dangerous, profligate, and unjust. 

But limited space requires us to forego further examination of par- 
ticular points of Administration policy, (however instructive and use- 
ful such examination might be,) and to confine ourselvgg to some gen- 
eral considerations which may be more briefly presented. And these 
will relate to the dangers which will threaten us (as results of Ad- 
ministration policy) during the war and afterwards. 

DANGERS IN CONNECTION WITH THE WAR. 

Under this head may be mentioned the state of our 

FINANCES AND CURRENCY. 

The unnecessary waste of the public resources in the war ; the enor- 
mous sums expended upon foolish and fruitless military expedi- 
tions, (sometimes badly planned and sometimes badly executed and 
supported,) and the other enormous sums corruptly or unwisely ex- 
pended in obtaining supplies and materials of war, would, of themselves, 
have been sufiicient to deeply injure the public credit, and to create 
fears of our future ability to bear the pecuniary burdens created by 
the war. And what ought to sting the minds of reflecting men, is the 
consideration that the general political policy of the Administration 
has been such that it has prolonged the war by depriving us of allies 
and sympathy in the enemy's country, and frittered away the public 
energy upon other objects beside military success. 

In addition to which stands forth the fact, that this occasion of war 
has been seized upon to establish a system of Government paper money, 
which has caused the public expenditures and the public debt to be 
one half greater than they would otherwise have been, and introduced 
numerous and most serious evils and dangers into all the channels of 
commercial and business life. The crash of this system, and the 
failure of all the delusive hopes Imd arrangements based upon it, is 
not merely a possible but a probable event in the future. The ruin 
and suffering which such an event would entail cannot be overstated, 
and to avert it, or to mitigate its force, is one of the main objects 
which should be had in view in settling our future policy. Upon 
questions of currency and finance, we must revert to the ideas of 
former times in which alone can safety be found. 

In speaking of financial prospects and future pecuniary conditions, 
we do not overlook the fact that opinions very difi'erent from ours are 
expressed by the friends of power. But the appearances of prosperity 
to which they refer us, are delusive. 

Production in the country is now decreased, for great numbers of 



16 

laborers are employed in the war, and abstracted from industrial 
pursuits. 

Increased rates of value press hardly upon persons of fixed incomes, 
and upon all who are disabled or engaged in unprofitable employments. 

The war does not create wealth but consumes it, and consumes also 
the laborers by which it is produced. It devours the products of past 
and present industry, and checks the growth of population upon which 
future prosperity depends. 

And the inevitable evils of a state of war — the injury and destruc- 
tion of material interests, the waste, spoliation and improvidence that 
characterize it — are aggravated by profuse issues of Government paper 
money which incite to reckless expenditure, public and private, and 
disguise for the time the fearful consumption of wealth and the sure 
approach of a day of sufi"ering and retribution. 

This expenditure and the accumulation of debts, public and private, 
cannot go on indefinitely or for any considerable time. The day of 
payment, which will be also the day of trouble, will surely come. Great 
suffering will fall upon the people. Those who suppose themselves in- 
dependent of the frowns of fortune, will realize the retribution which 
always follows upon excess, and even those wholly innocent of any 
complicity with financial mismanagement or other evil feature of pub- 
lic policy, will be smitten equally with the guilty. 

The vast debt, created in great part by profligacy and mismanage- 
ment, is a source of profound anxiety to the people, who must pay it, 
and to the capitalists who hold it. Its obligation rests upon the secu- 
rity of the national ability and honor. But to prevent its growth 
beyond the point where bankruptcy threatens it with destruction, the 
folly and corruption which now waste and devour the wealth of the 
people must meet with speedy and condign overthrow. 

FOREIGN INTERVENTION. 

Another danger to be apprehended under our present rulers; one 
which has been speculated upon often since the war began, and which 
is possible hereafter, is the intervention of some foreign nation in the 
pending struggle. There is an example of such intervention in our 
history, which deserves contemplation by those who would justly judge 
our present situation, and make provision agaiast future dangers. 
Our fathers revolted and were sorely chastised therefor by their mon- 
arch. The sword smote them in all their coasts; their wealth was dried 
up, their cities occupied by their foes, their land ravaged. They were 
pushed to the extremity of endurance ; they became spent and ex- 
hausted by the conflict. But in their hour of extremest peril, France, 
at the instance of a Pennsylvania diplomatist, extended them her 
powerful assistance, and they emerged from the struggle triumphant 
and independent. Is this war to be mismanaged and perverted and 
protracted, until a foreign power may be induced to assist our antago- 
nist, as France assisted the revolted colonies of the third George ? Un- 
questionably the feeble, changeful, arbitrary and unwise policy of the 



17 

Administration, begets this danger of intervention, and vrill pioduce it 
if it ever take place. Nor has its diplomacy abroad been calculated 
to avert the evil consequences of its action at home. That diplomacy 
has not been wise, judicious and manly, but feeble, pretentious, and 
oflFensive. It should therefore be one of the leading objects in select- 
ing an Administration for the next four years, to avoid this danger of 
intervention by the selection of rulers who will not provoke it, and 
whose policy will command respect at home and abroad. 

DANGERS BEYOND THE WAR. 

But other dangers menace us under Republican rule, even if success 
in the war be secured. And as these, in a still greater degree than 
those already mentioned, deserve careful and earnest attention, we 
proceed to state them distinctly. 

OPPRESSIVE GOVERNMENT. 

If already we have experienced the arbitrary disposition and unlaw- 
ful practices of our rulers, what may we not experience after some 
time has elapsed, and when military success has rendered them still 
more insolent? If their assaults upon law and upon right be so nu- 
merous and flagrant while they are subjected to opposition and strug- 
gling to maintain their position against an open foe, what may we not 
expect when all constraint upon them is removed ? In considering 
what they have already done in opposition to liberty and lawful rule, 
we may exclaim, " If these things be done in the green tree, what 
shall be done in the dry ?" Let no one be deceived by the assertion, 
that the arbitrary and evil acts of the Administration indicate but a 
temporary policy, and are founded upon necessities which cannot long 
exist. Not only is the excuse that this policy of the Administration 
is necessary in view of the public interests, false in point of fact, it is 
equally untrue that if unopposed, if not put down, it will be of short 
duration and expire with the war. If it be necessary now to do un- 
lawful things and trample upon individual rights in adhering com- 
munities, the same pretended necessity will exist hereafter. Will it 
not be as necessary to uphold arbitrary government in order to prevent 
renewed revolt, as it is to support arbitrary government in order to sub- 
due existing rebellion? When did a ruler who had deprived his 
country of its libenies ever voluntarily restore them? That people 
who will accept excuses for tyranny, will always be abundantly sup- 
plied with them by their rulers, and especially will they be furnished 
with this argument of neeei^sity which will expand itself to the utmost 
requirement of despotic power under all circumstances. 

Our ancestors who settled this country and established the Govern- 
ment of the United States, fortunately did not admit this doctrine of 
necessity, but proceeded, under the guidance of a most wise and just 
policy, to tic up the hands cf official power by constitutional limita- 
tions, by checks and balances established in the very framework of 



18 

Government, and by inculcating among the mass of tlie people, in 
whom was to be lodged the ultimate or sovereign power, a profound 
respect for all private rights and for the laws by which they are secured 
and vindicated ; and we will do well to act upon their policy and fol- 
low in their footsteps. They trod the road of safety and made it plain 
before all succeeding generations, and we will be recreant to duty and 
false to our lineage, if we surrender the principles to which they held, 
or permit ourselves to be deluded by those arguments of power which 
they despised and rejected. 

Success itself in the odious policy now urged by the Administration, 
of the si.bjugation of one-third or more of the States of the Union, 
were it possible, could be so only at the price of the liberty of the 
whole country ; for our system would not admit of military rule over 
them. Necessarily populations within them must conduct local govern- 
ments, and exercise the proper portion of power pertaining to them in 
the Federal Government. In short, they could not be held as con- 
quered Territcries unless we should change our whole constitutional 
system and abandon altogether our experiment of freedom; and there- 
fore the imperative necessity of changing the issue between the sec- 
tions from one of coi'quest to one of restoration. Men must be chosen 
for public station who will know how to save to a bleeding country 
what is left, and restore what is lost, by securing peace on constitutional 
and just terms. 

CORRUPT GOVERNMENT. 

Another danger to be considered is, corrupt government, the necessary 
consequence of arbitrary principles practically applied in the affairs of 
the nation, or rather an accompanying principle. The vast increase 
of officers in all branches of the public service; the administration of 
a great public debt, including the management of a revenue system 
of gigantic proportions, will create numerous avenues of corruption, 
and when the Government is administered upon principles of coercion, 
it must necessarily subsidize large numbers of persons in order to 
maintain its authority. It is ever thus that strong governments, as 
they are called, must be corrupt ones, and the interests of the great 
mass of the people ba sacrificed to the interests of classes or individ- 
uals. A truly free government, where the authority of the rulers is 
supported by the free and uncoerced action of the people; where the 
laws are kept in perfect good faith and individual rights perfectly re- 
spected, is the only one which can be pure. 

INSECURITY. 

But, it is equally true, that a free government, not one free in form 
merely but in fact, is the most secure, both as regaids danger from ex- 
ternal force and from internal convulsion. If it be estHblished for a 
people not base minded but civilized and honorable, it will impart to 
them enormous force for resisting foreign aggression, while it preserves 



19 

them from internal revolt. Unquestionably, under ordinary condi- 
tions, thai, government is most secure which is most free. But in the 
hands of a sectional party, the future of this country is not secure. 
Not only is the danger of renewed revolt a possibility of the future, 
but the dangers of a foreign war are immensely increased. A dis- 
affected population weakens the Government in resisting invasion, and 
if such disaffection be sectional, then the country has a weak part 
throHigh which a foreign foe may strike its effectual and fearful blows. 

CORRUPTION OF RACE. 

A still more important consideration remains to be stated. We 
mean the social question, the question of the relations of race — with 
which our rulers are so little fitted to deal, and upon which such ex- 
treme, offensive and dangerous opinions are held by their prominent 
supporters. Whatever may be determined as to the negro race 
amongst us, it is manifest it is unfitted to participate in the exercise of 
political power, and that its incorporation, socially, and upon a princi- 
ple of equality with the mass of our countrymen, constitutes a danger 
compared to which all other dangers are insignificant. We suppose 
the men who established suffrage in this country, and from time to 
time have subjected it to new regulation, proceeded upon the principle 
of vesting it in those who were fitted for its exercise. Political powers 
being in their nature conventional, it is proper that they be estab- 
lished upon a basis of utility and convenience, and in sucli manner 
that they will not be subjected to abuse. Pursuing the same line of 
action pursued by our fathers, suffrage is to be withheld from those 
members of the social body who are manifestly unfit to exercise it, and 
whose participation therein must necessarily lead to abuse. Manifestly, 
a race of mankind who cannot support free institutions, regular gov- 
ernment, productive industry, and a high degree of civilization, of 
themselves, acting in an independent capacity, are unfit for perform- 
ing the functions of freemen in conducting the business of govern- 
ment amongst us. The argument of equality of rights for all men 
fails in their case, because of the absence of the conditions upon 
which it is founded. In the organization of a State, it is perfectly 
manifest that the social body cannot be identical with the political; 
that vast numbers comprised within the former are not to be included in 
the latter. We do not, in this country, include females, minors, un- 
naturalized foreigners, particular criminals, nor the insane, among 
those who exercise the right of suffrage. Incapacity or unfitness 
exists, to a greater or less extent, with all these extensive divisions of 
human beings, and the same ground of exclusion precisely exists in the 
case of the negro or other inferior race, who may be casually or per- 
manently placed arnongst us. Chinese, Malays, and the uncivilized 
Indians, fall within the same principle of exclusion. There is no rea- 
son why any general incapacity or insuflBcient capacity for electoral 
action, should be ignored in the case of one of these classes and not in 
another. Our governments were established by white men and for 



20 

•white men and their posterity forever, and it is for the common ad- 
vantage of all states and conditions of human beings, that the exclusion of 
the inferior races from suflPrage should be permanently continued. Thus 
only can this great experiment of freedom begun by our ancestors and 
continued by us, be carriel forward successfully, and be made to ac- 
complish the great and beneficent results of which it is capable. 

But the social aspect of this subject of the " relations of race," is 
equally important with the political, and intimately associated with it. 
It is of the highest policy, it is of the greatest; necessity, that the reces 
should be kept distinct, socially ; that they should not blend together 
to their mutual corruption and destruction. If an example were needed 
to admonish us upon this high point of policy, it would be furnished 
by the Spanish American Republics, who have run their troubled and 
inglorious career under our observation, and whose present condition 
may well awaken the pity or contempt of mankind. The Spaniard in the 
New World had not self-respect enough to keep himself uncontami- 
nated from the Negro and the Indian, and he inflicted upon his colo- 
nies all the curses and horrors of hybridism, until their social state 
has become degraded and poisoned beyond apparent redemption. 
Throughout all those extensive countries brought under control by the 
arms or policy of the Spanish crown, and which within the present 
century and in imitation of our example, have assumed republican 
forms of government, this disregard of natural law, this ignoring of 
the differences of race, has been the prolific cause of the social and 
political evils which scourge and afflict those unhappy countries. So- 
cial vices prevail to a fearful extent ; society is enfeebled and eaten 
out by them ; there is no steady productive labor, no increase of popu- 
lation, no uniform and just administration of law, but constant revolu- 
tions and insecurity of all thjse rightis which governments are estab- 
lished to protect and defend. 

OPPOSITION TO BE ORGANIZED. 

In view of the foregoing consi'lerations, and of many others which 
might be mentioned, an appeal for popular action against the evils of 
the time and the dangers which threaten us, must be thought timely 
and proper. The sure restoration of the Union an^ of a true admin- 
istration of our system of constitutional government, await the suc- 
cess of a great opposition party actuated by just aims and inspired by 
an earnest, patriotic determination to save the country and perpetuate 
its liberties. 

The idea of ignoring party in the accomplishment of great public 
objects, cannot be accounted one of wisdom. Great masses of men 
in a free country can act usefully and steadily only through some or- 
ganism which combines their power and gives it direction. Without 
organization, their strength, (all powerful when concentrated,) is dis- 
sipated and wasted, and the adventurous few seize upon the powers of 
government and pervert them to their own sinister designs. 



21 

No truth is more certain than this, that the destructive elements of 
society, (for instance fanaticism and rapacity by both cf which we are 
DOW afflicted,) can be held in permanent check in a republic, only by 
uniting patriotic and just men against them in some enduring associa- 
tion, which shall act steadily and powerfully upon government and 
preserve it in its due course. 

The problem for us now to solve is this : Are the people of the 
United States competent to organize themselves in defense of their 
system of free government and voluntary union, or must they resort 
to a dictator, armed with large powers, who will crush faction and re- 
store peace and union at the sacrifice of liberty ? Evil in the State 
will not die out, if left to itself. Some instrument adequate to its ex- 
tirpation must be sought and found, in the direction of either dictato- 
rial or popular power. 

Instead of looking to a dictator, to the despotic principle, to a strong 
executive government of large and concentrated powers, those who 
have faith in our American principles will look to the people, and will 
seek to rouse and organize them and direct their united strength 
against the evils of the time. Thus we believe the nation may be 
saved, and saved by itself, and be prepared to resume its career of 
prosperity rudely interrupted by the war. 

A great opposition party, made strong enough to carry the elections 
of 1864, is now the appropriate instrument for national redemption, 
and its success will be the triumph of free government and will extri- 
cate us from the jaws of destruction. 

That the party of the Administration is both vicious and incapable, 
has been most abundantly proved and ought no longer to be denied. 
It has ftiiled to restore the Union after three years of trial, though, 
possessed of all the powers of Government and of all the resources of 
the country. And meantime it has struck heavy blows at liberty, and 
is carrying us away from all the old landmarks of policy and adminis- 
tration. We are literally drifting toward destruction, with the knowl- 
edge that those who have charge of our vessel of State are unfit to di- 
rect its course. 

Eut there is yet time to avert much of calamity. The future at 
least may be made secure. To all who really desire the Union restored, 
and along with it honest, constitutional government, the appeal may 
now be made to assist in elevating a party to power which will be faith- 
ful to the Constitution, which will unite together the union elements 
of the whole country, will chastise corruption and fanaticism from the 
public Administration, and will secure the future from convulsion and 
despotism. 

Let the fact sick deeply into the hearts of our countrymen, that the 
great obstacle to peace, to re-union, to integrity in public afiairs, and 
to the renewal of prosperity, is the presence at the capital of the na- 
tion of the chiefs of a sectional party, who have been instrumental in 
plunging the nation into " a sea of troubles," and who are both incapa- 
ble and unwillino- to save it. 



22 



POLICY OF THE OPPOSITION. 

Having already spoken with just freedom of the Ad minist ration 
and of its policy and conduct, we proceed tr> indicate the position and 
views of the Opposition, who contend with the Administration for the 
possession of popular favor. 

We hold that all laws duly estahlished and existing shall be kept, and 
kept as well b_y persons in official station as by the mass of the people. 
Disregard of law and of rights established and guarantied by it, is one 
of the great evils of which just complaint must now be made. A 
change of Administration and of party power, will secui-e throughout 
the whole country subject to our jurisdiction, a just, faithful, and uni- 
form administration of the laws by the courts and by the President and 
his subordinates, and it will secure in the Congress of the United 
States, faithful obedience to the Constitution and an honest construc- 
tion of the powers conferred by it upon the legislative authority. The 
interruption of justice caused by an unnecessary suspension of the 
habeas corpus in the unrevolted States will, forthwith terminate; ar- 
bitrary arrests of persons in civil life will become unknown, and a pre- 
tended necessity overriding justice and right, and made 'the pretext for 
various forms of oppression and injustice, will disappear before are- 
turning sense of obligation and duty in our rulers. 

In the policy of the Federal Government there will be no recogni- 
tion of doctrines which tend to the social debasement and pollution of 
the people. The profligate and pernicious theories which, under the 
garb of philanthropy and a regard for human rights, would overthrow 
the natural barriers between different races and ignore wholly organic 
laws of difference between them, will not be promoted or favored in the 
policy of the Government of the United States. 

There will be an earnest and proper effort made to retrace the steps 
already taken in debasing the currency of the United States by large 
and unnecessary issues of paper money ; a system at once unauthor- 
ized and injurious, which impoverishes the country and distributes the 
earnings of labor to hands that have not earned it, will invite immedi- 
ate revision and ultimate removal from the statute bonk of the United 
States. 

The troops raised for the public service, whenever a necessity for 
raising them shall exist, will be rightfully obtained through the 
agency of the State Governments and be officered by State authority; 
thus securing, in the raising of armies for extraordinary occasions, the 
true intent and meaning of the Constitution, and preserving the armies 
of the United States from the undue political control of the Federal 
Executive. 

The action of the Government in its financial disbursements and 
other features of its administration, will be thrown open to full inves- 
tigation, and an earnest effort be made to purge it in all its branches 
of corruption. 

Economy of outlay, so much spoken of by those who now hold power 



23 

previous to their election and so little regarded by them since, will 
be reinstated in the practice of the Government as one of the essential 
rules of its action. 

The doctrine that the States shall possess and exercise all ungranted 
powers, and shall be free within their jurisdiction from the encroach- 
ments of Federal authority, shall be rigidly maintained. 

The system of public revenue shall be adjusted so as to bear equally 
upon all sections and interests, and the unnecessary increase of officers 
in collecting it, as well as in other departments of public service, shall 
be avoided. 

The exertion of public force in the war to be exclusively for the 
object for which the war was begun, to wit: the restoration of the 
Union and the jurisdiction of our laws over the revoked country; 
and being confined to that object, and relieved from the incumbrance 
of other objects, to be brought to a speedy and honorable con- 
clusion. But further, it may be confidently asserted, that an opposi- 
tion triumph in our elections will call into existence moral forces more 
powerful even than physical force for securing peace upon the basis 
of re-union. And it may be the only means for securing that great 
object, hitherto unrealized, and postponed and prevented by the policy 
and incapacity of our rulers. 

Beside the revision of our domestic policy and the restoration of 
constitutional principles therein, the great objects to which we look, 
are, the conclusion of the war and the just determination of the ques- 
tions connected therewith. The burden of this contest has become 
intolerable. Patience has been exhibited by the people of the United 
States to the utmost extent of forbearance. They were told the war 
would last but sixty days; they were told the South was not united; 
they have been deluded throughout the contest, now more than three 
years in duration, by promises of speedy success; they have been told 
to trust and applaud military chieftains who were afterwards retired 
from service, and denounced and calumniated by those who had in- 
culcated their praise; they have seen a variety of enterprises, both by 
land and water, miscarry outright, or fail in securing the objects for 
which they were undertaken ; they have seen the prices of all the ne- 
cessaries and comforts of life go up to enormous rates, beyond the 
ability of all who are not rich, or favored by Grovernment patronage ; 
they have undergone domestic bereavement and bitter sorrow in all 
their homes, from losses incurred in the war ; they have been con- 
stantly supplied with false information about curi'ent events, and have 
still ofi"ered them promises of speedy and complete success quite un- 
warranted by the past achievements of their rulers, and which ignore 
all the real, indubitable difiiculties, original and created, which attend 
the struggle. But one thing they have not been told — one great and 
important fact has not been disseminated under Government censor- 
ship, nor appeared anywhere in official documents — to wit, that success 
in the war and the speedy return of peace, have been all this time 
prevented, and will be hindered if not prevented hereafter, by the 
evil and odious policy and the incapacity of the Administration itself! 



24 

These, have united the South; these, have nerved the arms of South- 
ern soldiers in the field and inspirited them to united, earnest, deter- 
mined resistance to our arms : these, in the darkest moments of the 
contest, have rendered their submission impossible. They, and the 
populations they represent, have seen before them the alternative of 
complete independence on the one hand, as the possible result to be 
achieved by valor, skill, and endurance, and on the other, as the result 
of submission, confit^cation, emancipation, disgrace, and the iron rule 
of the conqueror; and viewincr their position as presenting only a 
choice between these results, they have girded themselves up to her- 
culean and dei^perate eiForts and still stand defiant and unbroken. 

It is not for us to, foretell the future, but it is possible to conceive its 
dangers and to make reasonable provision against them. Certainly, it 
is possible for the people of the United States, by selecting new rulers, 
to put their public aiFairs, including this business of the war, upon a 
new footing — to remove the main obstacle to peace and reunion, which 
has impeded their great efforts hitherto, and rendered their sufferings 
and sacrifices unavailing for the object for which they were incurred. 
This is the great and necessary work to be done by them in regaining 
the road of safety, and to its performance they are earnestly invited. 

When the members of the present Administration are removed 
from power, and patriotic and just men are made to fill their places, 
the people of the adhering sections of the country will have done their 
part in removing the cause of war and the obstacle to peace, and will 
be represented by men competent alike to conduct war and to secure 
peace, who will call into existence, for the redemption and reunion of 
the country, moral influences more potent than physical force, and who 
will achieve their mission before exhaustion and intolerable suffering 
have been incurred. 

RECONSTRUCTION. 

The propositions which should obtain in the reconstruction of the 
Union are not difficult of statement, and when contrasted with the pol- 
icy of the Administration will appear to peculiar advantage. 

The first is, that the States shall stand as before the war, except as to 
changes which may be agreed upon between or among them. The Consti- 
tution of the United States is the rightful and only bond of union for 
the States composing the Confederacy, and it is to stand as it is, in its 
full integrity, until the parties who are bound by it shall change its 
terms or add to it new provisions. Any other doctrine is revolutionary 
and destructive and to be utterly rejected, whether founded upon Pres- 
idential proclamations or statutes enacted by Congress. The powers of 
the Federal Grovernment in all its branches are confined within the 
provisions of the Constitution and cannot transcend them. Therefore 
the Constitution as it is, including its power of regular amendment, is 
the leading doctrine of the great party which proposes to save the na- 
tion in this the day of its sore trial. Let the false and guilty doctrine 
that the President of the United States by proclamation, or the Con- 



25 

gress tbereof by statute, can prescribe, alter, add to or diminish the con- 
ditious of union between the States be discarded at once and forever, 
and most of the difficulties which appear to attend the question of re- 
construction will wholly disappear. Tbose departments of the Gov- 
ernment are confined to particular legislative and executive duties, and 
cannot touch or determine the relations of the States with each other. 
That field of power is sacred to the great organized communities by 
whom the Union was formed and by whom alone it can be subjected to 
modification or change. We have fought to restore the Union, not to 
change it, much less to subvert its fundamental principles, and the ac- 
complishment of its restoration is the compensation we propose to our- 
selves for all the cost and sacrifices of the struggle. 

But what is impossible to the President or to Congress it is compe- 
tent for the States, in their sovereign capacity, by free mutual con- 
sent, at the proper time, to perform. 

The American States required a compact of union to go through the 
war of the Revolution, and it was made. Subsequently they required 
an amended compact, creating a more intimate union, to secure to them 
the fruits of independence. From their deliberations on the latter 
occasion there resulted that most admirable instrument, the Constitutioa 
of the United States, under which the Republic has existed and pros- 
pered for more than seventy years. And now, under our experience 
of revolt and war and misgovernment, we may conclude that additional 
securities for liberty and Union should be established in the funda- 
mental law. But these securities must consist of limitations rather 
than of extensions of Federal authority, and must not invade those 
fields of power which were left sacred to State jurisdiction in the 
original scheme of Union. 

The Constitution should provide against the uncontrolled domi- 
nation of sectional parties. South or North, in the Government of 
the United States, as the most indispensable and vital regulation 
possible for our safety and continued existence as a Republic. We 
refer upon this point to our remarks at the beginning of the present 
address, as exhibiting the grounds upon which this most important 
proposition may stand, and as illustrating its utility and necessity 
beyond all cavil or question. An adequate, real, and efficient check 
in Government, securing a balance of power between political in- 
terests, is unquestionably the highest and most important point in 
constitutional science; and it is most evident that because our system 
has been found defective in this particular, we are now involved in 
war and scourged by misgovern^nent in its most intolerable, odious 
and lawless forms. The checks already provided in our Constitution 
and which have been so salutary in their action and influence upon 
the Government, must be supplemented by some proper provision 
which shall more perfectly perform the office and function for which 
they were designed. For it is now proved amid the blood and tears 
of this nation, that all balance in our Government may be lost and 
all its checks be found insufficient to curb the insolence and guilt of 
faction and secure obedience to those fundamental principles of liberty, 



26 

law, and uisht, -whlcli were established by our fathers. "We are at 
war, aud biood flows, and wealth is wasted, and fanaticism runs riot, 
and the Constitution is broken, aud we are bowed down by bitter 
grief aud sorrow in all our homes, because a sectional faction rules 
the Government of the United States, free from restraint, or curb, or 
limitation of its powers. And it should be made impossible that this 
condition of things can again exist, after we have once extricated 
ourselves fiom the grasp of calamity. 

There should also be a judicious limitation upon the distri- 
bution of Federal patronage. The prodigious growth and present 
extent of that patronage in official appointments, constitutes a fertile 
source of corruption and danger. Nearly the whole mass of Federal 
appointments arc poised every four years upon a presidential election, 
intensifying and debasing the struggle forpowei-, and sowing the seeds 
of corruption broadcast throughout the laud. Purity, economy and 
justice in government become almost impossible under this system, 
and their restoration and maintenance demand its amendmeut. A 
change by which the great body of public officers would hold for 
fixed terms, and be removable only for lawful cause, would be one of 
great merit aud wisdom, aud is among the most desirable objects to be 
sought in our public policy. 

AMNESTY. 

Another proposition pertaining to reconstruction is, that as to indi- 
viduals there shall be amnesty except for particular offences. All the 
excesses of a state of war cannot be visited with judicial punishment. 
Both necessity and policy require that, at the conclusion of such a 
struggle, the mantle of oblivion shall cover the past. A nation torn 
by civil war demands repose at its conclusion, that society may be re- 
organized and that the passions aud demoralization produced by war 
may disappear before the renewed action of moral forces. Laws of 
confiscation and treason may be politic and necessary to prevent insur- 
rection or to check it in the outset, but they become inapplicable when 
revolt has ripened into public war, and one entire people are organized 
against another. Penal enactments when directed against a whole 
population are odious and useless, and their tendency is to proLng and 
intensify war, and to embarrass or prevent its just conclusion. Their 
office is to chastise individual offenders within Government jurisdic- 
tion, and not entire communities contending for independence or other 
public object. The laws of war necessarily aud properly obtain between 
the parties to a war pending the contest, and displace or supersede those 
of n.unicipal enactment. Amnesty therefore, within the limit of pub- 
lic safety, follows of course the termination of such a contest as that in 
which we are now engaged. 

It may be added that clear justice requires that Unionists who have 
fled from the revolted country should be restored to their estates, and 
that the particular wrongs inflicted upon them should as far as possible 
be redressed. 



27 



A CONTRAST. 



We have tlins taken notice of several questions connected with the 
Subject of Reconstruction and indicated our views upon tlieni. How 
much opposed those views are to the policy of the Administration will 
appear upon the most cursory examination. They point to the 
determination and settlement of disputes upon a just and reasonable 
basis, and to the security of the country against the recurrence of 
war hereafter ; while the policy of the Administration points to a simple 
alternative between the subjugation and independence of the South. 
If we succeed in the war, we have a conquei-ed country to hold and 
govern as we best may; and if we fail in the war, a rival and hostile 
power will be established beside us. The Administration has no instru- 
ment for national redemption except physical force, (which it has 
shown itself hitherto incompetent to wield,) and whether it succeed 
or fail, the future is encompassed with dangers. Representing radi- 
cal and violent elements of population among us, its party interests 
require of it an uncompromising and hostile attitude not only towards 
the confederate government but to the whole Southern people. In fact, 
the President virtually announces to us in his bogus State proclamation, 
that he can trust no men in the South except under most stringent 
oaths of approval of his policy ^nd within the diroct military influence 
of the army. Under the present administration, therefore, each party 
to the war strives for a clean victory or an utti r defeat, and no agree- 
ment between them except one of disunion is proposed or is possible. 
We submit to our countrymen that this statement of fact pronounces 
the utter condemnation of the Administration and establishes sol- 
idly the argument for its I'emoval from power, and this, too, indepen- 
dent of the other considerations which we have presented. Impotent 
in war, incapable of securing a just and speedy peace, competent only 
to waste the blood and resources of the people, it stands as fully con- 
demned in its policy against the enemy as it does in its measures of 
internal administration. And we are justified in concluding upon the 
whole case, that if the Union is to be restored, liberty preserved, and 
prosperity renewed in this country, those results must follow the defeat 
and rejection of the Administration by the American people. 

The defeat of Mr. Lincoln removes the main obstacle to 

REUNION and restores AT ONCE THE JUST RULE OP THE CONSTI- 
TUTION OVER THE ADHERING STATES. 



28 



CONCLUSION. 



There are but two classes of men in this country who may rejoice 
in existing conditions: First. Those who make money out of the war, 
and second, those who desire to achieve emancipation by it. Ks to 
the former, their thirst for sudden wealth is gratified and it is not in 
their nature to regret deeply those calamities which fall upon their fel- 
low-countrymen but from which they are exempted. And as to the 
radical abolitionist, his cup of enjoyment is almost full. lie believes 
that emancipation will take place or the Union remain broken forever. 
Either result satisfies him profoundly and wholly, and no possible event 
during his existence can compete with either of these in merit and 
excellence. 

But has not the country borne all it can reasonably bear, in fact 
much more than it can reasonably bear, for the gratification of these two 
classes of men, and shall not the Administration of the Government 
under favor of which they nestle in power and gratify their unholy 
greed and thei; detestable passions, be thrown out of power, thus reliev- 
ing the country from this nightmare of corruption and fanaticism 
which is pressing out its very existence ? 

Short-sighted and passionate men rush on to accomplish an imme- 
diate object, unable to perceive the consequences which lie beyond the 
present moment, and unwilling to believe thaff new obstacles in their 
path of passion and vengeance will succeed to the existing ones. They 
vainly think that if slavery be struck down by force, regardless of law 
or civil obligation, and negro equality be established in its stead, no 
subject of difficulty, no cause of national peril, no '' stone of stumbling" 
will remain in the path of our national progress. Vain delusion ! 
Such expectations are proved to be false by a thousand examples in 
history. The source of danger is in these wild passions let loose in 
the land which will not regard civil obligations, and which in their 
headlong fury tread under foot both public law and individual right. 
We do not decry theory, but we assert that statesmanship is concerned 
mainly in the domain of the practical, and that in the present imper- 
fect c ndition of human affairs it is obliged to modify general ideas and 
adapt them to existing conditions, which are infinitely diverse in differ- 
ent countries and at different times. And as all political powers are 
conventional, that is, established by express or implied consent, the 
validity of any political act must rest upon the ground that it is 
authorized. Some distinct authority for it must be shown, or we must 
determine against its existence. And to the existence of a free gov- 
ernment, and to the harmony and prosperity of a country wherein it is 
established, there must be a profound and constant respect by rulers 
and by people for all those things which have been agreed upon or 
instituted in affairs of government, Ad there must be a careful re- 
pression of all the destructive forces by which the bands of society are 



29 

loosened and license or abuse introduced into public or social action* 
Of destructive forces constituting capital causes of danger, corruption 
and fanaticism (before mentioned) must be ranked as chief; and are 
they not now both in existence, and conspicuous beyond any former 
example in these United States ? Are they not predominant charac- 
teristics of the party which achieved success in 1860, and has since 
held and now holds possession of political power ? And can there be 
hope of the future so long as these destructive principles run their 
course uurebuked and uncurbed ? The sound elements of society must 
be brought to the surface, the body politic be purged of its unhealthy 
elements, and in places of public trust, just and broad-minded, pure and 
tolerant men be substituted for radicals and corruptionists. Then will 
the laws be kept; then W'ill free individual action be permitted and 
permissible; crime only will be punished, and harmony and peaceful 
relations and widely-diffused prosperity succeed to violence, intolerance, 
waste, bloodshed; and debauchmcnt of the national life ! 

^ C. R. BUCKALEW, 

SAMUEL J. RANDALL, 
JOHN I). STILES, 
S. E. ANCONA, 
MYER STROUSE, 
PHILIP JOHNSOx\, 
CHARLES DENISON, 
WM. H. MILLER, 
A. H. COFFROTH, 

1 enn^T/lvania. 

GEORGE H. PENDLETON, 
J. F. McKINNEY, 
F. C. LeBLOND, 
CHILTON A. WHITE, 

WILLIAM JOHNSTON, 
WARREN P. NOBLE, 
W. A. HUTCHINS, 
WILLIAM E. FINCK, 
JOHN O'NEILL, 
GEORGE BLISS, 
JAMES R. MORRIS, 
J. W. WHITE, 

Ohio. 

- THOMAS A. HENDRICKS, 
JOHN LAW, 
JAMES A. CRAVENS, 
JOSEPH K. EDGEKTON, 

JAMES F. Mcdowell, 

Indiana. 



30 

W. A. RICHARDSON, 
C. M. HARRIS, 
JOHN R. EDEN, 
LEWIS W. ROSS, 
A. L. KNAPP, 
J. C. ROBINSON, 
W. R MORRISON, 
WILLIAM J. ALLEN, 

ininois. 

CHARLES A. ELDRIDGE, 

Wisconsin. 

L. W. POWELL, 
GARRETT DAVIS, 

Kentuckt/. 

JOHN S. CARLISLE, 

Virginia. 

W. SAULSBURY, 
GEORGE READ RIDDLE, 

Delaware. 

A. J. ROGERS, 

' JVew Jersey. 

DANIEL MARCY, 

New Hampshire. 



Washington, July 2, 1864. 



31 



[After the preparation of the foregoing Address, at the very conclusion of 
the session of Congress, two extraordinary mc asures relating to subjects treated 
in the Address, were enacted into laws. They were both approved by the 
President, on the 4th day of July, and fitly concluded the labors of the Con- 
gressional majority. Those measures were : 1st, a further supplement to the 
conscription law; and 2nd, a joint resolution imposing a special and secondia- 
come-tax for the year 1863. The former was entitled " An act further to regu- 
late and provide for the enrolling and calling out of the national forces, and 
fo/-other purposes," and authorized the President, at his discretion, to call out 
troops for one, two, or three years ; provided for bounties of one, two, or three 
hundred dollars to each recruit, according to the time of service, payable in 
three equal instalments ; and authorized drafts for unfilled quotas after fifty 
days from the date of the call ; but in case of any such draft no payment of 
money should be accepted or received by the Government as commutation to 
release any enrolled or drafted man from personal obligation to perform mili- 
tary service. 

The third section reads as follows : 

" Sec. 3. That it shall be lawful for the Executives of any of the States to 
send recruiting agents into any of the States declared to be in rebellion, except 
the States of Arkansas, Tennessee, and Louisiana, to recruit volunteers under 
any call under the provisions of this act, who shall be credited to the State, 
and to the respective subdivisions thereof, which may procure their enlist- 
ment>" 

The sixth section provides, that in drafts one hundred j;'cr centum of names 
more than the quota shall be drawn. 

The eighth section reads as follows : 

"Sec. 8. That all persons in the naval service of the United States who 
have entered said service during the present rebellion, who have not been 
credited to the quota of any town, district, ward, or State, by reason of their 
being in said service and not enrolled prior to February twenty- fourth, eighteen 
hundred and sixty-four, shall be enrolled and credited to the quota of the town, 
ward, district, or State in which they respectively reside, upon satisfactory 
proof of their residence made to the Secretary of War." 

Such is the law which abolishes commutation, and provides a plan by which 
certain States may escape the pressure of a draft. They are to be authorized 
through their agents to obtain negroes in the southern country to fill up their 
quotas, (the bounties for this purpose being paid by the United States,) and 
in the commercial States all the sailors and marines who have entered the 
service since the outbreak of the rebellion, are to be enumerated and credited 
to the States of their residence, whether citizens or not. The States which 
are most enterprizing in the race for negro recruits, and have most facilities 
for obtaining them, will reap the main advantages of this arrangement. But 



82 

c, 
the public interests will suffer, and States remote from tlie seaboard will be 
subjected to an unjust discrimination. 

The vote in the Senate, July 2, upon adopting the report of the Committee 
of Conference, which gave this act its final form, was as follows : 

" Yeas — Messrs. Anthony, Chandler, Clark, Conness, Fessenden, Foot, Foster, 
Hale, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sumner, Van Win- 
kle, Wade, Wilkinson, and Wilson — 18. 

" Nays — Messrs. Buckalew, Carlile, Davis, Doolittle, Harlan, Harris, Hen- 
derson, Hendricks, Howe, Lane of Indiana, McDougall, Powell, Riddle, Sauls- 
bury, Sherman, Trumbull, and Willey — 17." 

It will be observed that one half the whole affirmative vote was from the " 
States east of the Hudson. 

But, to meet the expenditure for bounties under this law, the joint ,tes9]fem\ 
tion before mentioned, imposing a special income tax, was passed. It provides 
that, upon the first day of October next, a tax of five per centum upon incomes 
of 1863 (in excess of $600) shall be assessed and paid. These inconjes having 
been already subjected to a tax, this tax is a second imposition upqih the same 
object for the same time, and swells the tax in most cases fcotfn three to eight 
per cent. The pressure of this measure upon persons of fisedf incomes is 
severe, and it sets aside the doctrine that the same article o» object shall be 
taxed but once by Government for a given period, its form'Und use remaining 
unchanged. Upon this ground, a tax upon liquors on band (which had 
already been taxed) was voted down at the late session after prolonged debate.] 



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